What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Stronger ( Or Does It?)

Lately, because of my heart problems I see myself forced to wander the labyrinth of the health care system.

While health care for everybody has many advantages, it has its holes, too. Deep, dark ones you can easily fall into if you don’t pay attention.

And I am writing this not only because it does me good, you know, spill it out, but also because I think there is a lesson to be learned somewhere.

Following the episode with my heart going berserk, I managed to get hold of my family doctor. I asked a clerk from my HMO to help me because I couldn’t get an appointment with my doctor until the end of the month. The clerk, a young woman, was very helpful. In the end the doctor contacted me and gave me referrals to tests.

I also asked for medication because I was scared the episode could repeat itself.

She gave me a prescription.

But, after I acquired the medication and read the leaflet that came with it, I discovered I couldn’t take it. I have a history of asthma, and under no circumstances am I supposed to take this medicine. Unless, of course, I wanted it to trigger an asthma attack.

Great. Just great!

I swore so badly and so creatively that I was ashamed of myself.

How? Why? How was I supposed to know?

I don’t understand. It is there. In my medical records. I bet she didn’t check, because it was the end of her shift and after seeing a million patients, she was tired.

Still. I try to understand.

But what keeps coming into my mind is: what would have happened if I had taken the pill?

It has happened before, you know. A doctor wanted to give me medication I was allergic to. Again, it was in my records.

Same shit happened to my husband. He received a treatment he wasn’t supposed to have because of another underlying medical condition. It affected him badly. We had to go to the emergency room.

Go figure.

It is not enough that I cannot have any tests done until the middle or end of October because everybody is on vacation. Now I have to wait until my family doctor returns from her holiday at the end of the month to change my medication.

In case I don’t die before then.

I can also try to begin the saga of phone calls and questions and see if somebody else can do it.

I don’t have anything against doctors. I think they are great guys and gals. Heck, my daughter is going to become one. I know they are overworked and underpaid.

But how is this my fault?

Isn’t there some magical computer program that could cross-check your ailments, allergies, medications, stuff like that? And if you were prescribed something you shouldn’t take, some alarm would go off, with loud shrieks and ambulance lights going over their heads?

If not, maybe somebody should invent it.

I am just tired.

I just want to know what is wrong with my heart, not play pill detective. I don’t want to take part in this stupid game of hide-and-seek that makes me more anxious, more stressed while I am already trying to figure out what the hell is happening inside my own body.